Latest / The Sean O'Connell Show / Ari Temkin on Deion Sanders instituting a fine system for his players, Dabo's comments on the transfer portal, Super Bowl matchup + more

Transcript

Ari Temkin on Deion Sanders instituting a fine system for his players, Dabo's comments on the transfer portal, Super Bowl matchup + more · The Sean O'Connell Show

0:04
Speaker 1: You're tuned to the Sean O'Connell Show for the Murdoch
0:07
Speaker 1: Chevrolet Studio of ESPN seven hundred and ninety two to
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Speaker 1: one FM.
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Speaker 2: Sean O'Connell Show on ESPN seven hundred and ninety two
0:23
Speaker 2: one FM, or a Tempkins set to join us here.
0:26
Speaker 2: Shortly interesting weekend to sports or sports programming viewing. Whatever
0:33
Speaker 2: you had basketball on hockey on you were waiting for
0:37
Speaker 2: the NFL playoffs. Saturday, you had return to action by
0:41
Speaker 2: the UFC justin Gaichee with a championship victory over Patty Pimblett.
0:48
Speaker 2: For all of you out there who cared about that,
0:50
Speaker 2: I loved seeing it. Justin Gaichee with an interim lightweight championship.
0:55
Speaker 2: He becomes the oldest person at thirty seven years of age,
0:58
Speaker 2: becomes the oldest person to win a lightweight belt in
1:02
Speaker 2: the UFC, and he did it in pretty impressive fashion.
1:06
Speaker 2: Patty Pinmbock was impressive too. He took a nasty beating
1:09
Speaker 2: but didn't go away. And the paramount era of the
1:14
Speaker 2: UFC begins. They changed their bonus structure to go along
1:18
Speaker 2: with their one point one billion dollar deal, sorry, one
1:24
Speaker 2: point one billion dollars per year from paramount and Paramount plus.
1:29
Speaker 2: So I think a successful start to that new partnership.
1:36
Speaker 2: I got to give credit where it's due for the UFC,
1:38
Speaker 2: because there's been a lot of conversation, especially in recent years.
1:43
Speaker 3: And look, they were they were subject to.
1:49
Speaker 2: A lawsuit, a class action lawsuit settlement that they already
1:52
Speaker 2: had to pay out. They've got another one coming and
1:54
Speaker 2: another one after that that is probably going to be
1:56
Speaker 2: even more costly for them, and so you know, the
1:59
Speaker 2: company reluctantly is doing things to try to meet fighters
2:03
Speaker 2: where they need to be when it comes to pay.
2:06
Speaker 2: And they've now instituted a finished bonus. So anyone who's
2:09
Speaker 2: familiar with the sport, they would give out nightly bonuses
2:14
Speaker 2: three usually three three bonuses, Fight of the night, Performance
2:17
Speaker 2: of the night, Submission of the night, whatever. And now
2:20
Speaker 2: anytime you get a finish, if you get if you
2:22
Speaker 2: finish the fight, submission or knockout, you get twenty five grand.
2:25
Speaker 2: And then they doubled the bonuses for like Fight of
2:28
Speaker 2: the Night. Now it's one hundred grand instead of fifty grand,
2:31
Speaker 2: which is it's kind of a big deal. So anyway,
2:34
Speaker 2: shout out to Justin Gaichee. He's been on the show before,
2:37
Speaker 2: by the way, who is just a great dude and
2:41
Speaker 2: becomes the oldest lightweight champion, oldest person to win the
2:46
Speaker 2: lightweight belt in UFC history. Ari Tempkin joins us now
2:51
Speaker 2: to talk a little college football. Well, we'll talk all
2:55
Speaker 2: football with Ari Tempkin because he's just a fan of
2:58
Speaker 2: that sport in every sport.
3:00
Speaker 3: Hey, welcome back. How are you.
3:01
Speaker 1: I'm good?
3:02
Speaker 4: Oh see, how are you?
3:02
Speaker 3: Man? I'm doing all right.
3:04
Speaker 2: It feels weird to not have like a you know,
3:06
Speaker 2: college football game to react to. Obviously, NFL playoffs and
3:10
Speaker 2: things like that are still going, but the football season
3:13
Speaker 2: on the college front, from a competitive standpoint, has been
3:16
Speaker 2: over and I'm starting to fade from consciousness and.
3:19
Speaker 3: I don't like that feeling.
3:20
Speaker 2: But plenty of off the field things that we have
3:23
Speaker 2: to discuss, and I'll start with the decision that was
3:27
Speaker 2: made last week to just keep the twelve team expanded
3:30
Speaker 2: college football playoff at twelve teams. Was this the right
3:33
Speaker 2: call for you?
3:36
Speaker 4: I mean, it's interesting from the standpoint of you know,
3:40
Speaker 4: what were the other or the alternatives here? You know,
3:43
Speaker 4: the twenty fourteen playoffs seems a bridge too far at
3:47
Speaker 4: this point in time, and you know it. It feels like,
3:50
Speaker 4: based on what it's been reported that you know, the
3:54
Speaker 4: SEC was all in on, as was the Big twelve
3:57
Speaker 4: and the ACC and now every other conference on expanding
3:59
Speaker 4: this sixteen teams with the Big ten. Who's you know,
4:03
Speaker 4: obviously the second power broker here was basically like, it's
4:05
Speaker 4: twenty four or nothing, or at least you know, they
4:07
Speaker 4: had to have written in some sort of agreement that
4:11
Speaker 4: eventually they would work towards twenty four, which again I
4:14
Speaker 4: think is just a bridge too far. Maybe you know,
4:16
Speaker 4: at some point it makes a ton of sense, but
4:18
Speaker 4: to go from twelve to twenty four to double the pool,
4:21
Speaker 4: and then what does that mean for conference championship games
4:23
Speaker 4: and the schedule? Like I think it's sixteen could have
4:26
Speaker 4: been a seamless transition, pretty easy. I think twenty four
4:29
Speaker 4: would have taken a lot of adjusting the calendar. So
4:33
Speaker 4: you know, that's why we're at this impass. So I
4:35
Speaker 4: guess I'm fine with twelve. I'd definitely prefer twelve to
4:38
Speaker 4: twenty four. And it also feels, oh see, like this
4:43
Speaker 4: is just kind of the tip of the iceberg in
4:45
Speaker 4: terms of issues that we're dealing with that need to
4:47
Speaker 4: get sort of finalized and settled here in college football.
4:52
Speaker 2: You mentioned the calendar in the calendar was a major
4:55
Speaker 2: point of discussion this postseason, more so than any re
4:59
Speaker 2: year I can remember. And you know, if COVID taught
5:02
Speaker 2: us anything, it's that the college football world can be
5:06
Speaker 2: a lot more nimble than we ever gave it credit
5:08
Speaker 2: for previous two the shutdowns. Are we going to see
5:13
Speaker 2: any kind of significant votes, discussions, maybe even changes on
5:17
Speaker 2: the college football calendar in the short term?
5:20
Speaker 4: I mean, for me, I can't for the life that
5:23
Speaker 4: may figure out how there's some things that you know,
5:26
Speaker 4: we shouldn't have changed immediately. I mean I think so
5:29
Speaker 4: there's there's sort of two thoughts here. There would be like, okay,
5:33
Speaker 4: the off season calendar, right, and you know, how do
5:38
Speaker 4: you adjust the off season calendar? And then there's the
5:40
Speaker 4: nd season calendar. I think the off season calendar, though,
5:43
Speaker 4: oh see, at this point is much easier to adjust.
5:45
Speaker 4: I mean, you have to look at the springs football
5:48
Speaker 4: still makes sense? Does the transfer portal window where it is,
5:54
Speaker 4: does that make sense? Does the early signing period make sense?
5:58
Speaker 4: I would say no, you know that where we are
6:01
Speaker 4: at this point in time to have the early signing window,
6:04
Speaker 4: which has become kind of the signing period in December
6:06
Speaker 4: makes zero sense. You know, it feels like you should
6:08
Speaker 4: move that back up to February when it initially was
6:11
Speaker 4: that you're in the fall on off season. Then it
6:12
Speaker 4: feels like, if we're following a model of the NFL
6:15
Speaker 4: off season, you go from you know, the signing period
6:17
Speaker 4: in February, the draft free agencies should be around there,
6:20
Speaker 4: So maybe the poor should be open at that point
6:22
Speaker 4: in time. And I know that that, you know, Hamper's
6:25
Speaker 4: spring football, but springs football probably has to change too,
6:27
Speaker 4: and probably should be more mirroring that of an NFL
6:30
Speaker 4: off season with OTAs. So you know, I feel like
6:34
Speaker 4: that's the most obvious change and move that needs to
6:37
Speaker 4: be happening, and yet we haven't really seen any adjustments.
6:40
Speaker 4: But like I would start with the off season schedule
6:42
Speaker 4: and then perhaps adjust the end season schedule. But like
6:45
Speaker 4: the early signing period, to me, it's nonsensical for it
6:48
Speaker 4: to be, you know, exist anymore. I think initially the
6:50
Speaker 4: reason it was implemented made sense, but you know, now
6:54
Speaker 4: here we are six seven, eight years later from when
6:56
Speaker 4: it was initially implemented, and it doesn't make much sense anymore,
6:59
Speaker 4: especially where it is so like for me, you go
7:01
Speaker 4: back to that February, it makes a lot more sense
7:03
Speaker 4: the season's over. I think you also have to adjust
7:06
Speaker 4: again when the portal is so that you're not running
7:07
Speaker 4: the portal into the end of the regular the end
7:10
Speaker 4: of the postseason. That also makes no sense. So it
7:12
Speaker 4: feels like those should both be kind of February events
7:15
Speaker 4: which then lead to some sort of get together with
7:17
Speaker 4: a team in spring. Probably they'll be pushed back a
7:20
Speaker 4: little bit in what we're used to with spring football,
7:22
Speaker 4: where it's you know, January February probably should be more
7:25
Speaker 4: towards February March, you know, and then into the summertime
7:28
Speaker 4: where you probably have more OTAs. I think like every
7:32
Speaker 4: school should be looking at it holistically, like the spring
7:34
Speaker 4: football still makes sense, and can we make, you know,
7:36
Speaker 4: adjustments to spring football that then allow us to adjust
7:39
Speaker 4: the signing period, the transit portal, and then you know,
7:43
Speaker 4: and then how we bring this team together at some point.
7:46
Speaker 2: Ari Tempkin is my guest here on the Sean O'Connell
7:49
Speaker 2: show Big twelve today on tune In Radio, friend of
7:52
Speaker 2: the program, as he's joined us all football season long,
7:56
Speaker 2: Dabo Swinney is sometimes a punchline and sometimes he is
8:00
Speaker 2: a hero. And I will put the most recent Dabbo
8:04
Speaker 2: headline in the hero category. He went out name and names,
8:09
Speaker 2: time Stamp and communications and calling out Ole miss and
8:13
Speaker 2: their GM their staff for tampering with a linebacker recruit
8:18
Speaker 2: that was committed to and in class at Clemson. And
8:24
Speaker 2: you know, he he seems like he's pretty insistent. They're
8:28
Speaker 2: going to pursue this to the ends of whatever earth
8:31
Speaker 2: Clemson wants to exist on right now? Will we see
8:35
Speaker 2: anything meaningful come out of this other than just a
8:37
Speaker 2: viral moment where Dabo got everyone's attention by highlighting and
8:43
Speaker 2: showing us the details of how tampering works in college football.
8:48
Speaker 4: I'm so glad you brought this up and pointed this
8:50
Speaker 4: out because I'm totally on the same page with you
8:53
Speaker 4: in terms of, like, I love this, and there's probably
8:55
Speaker 4: no more credible coach that could speak out on this
8:58
Speaker 4: than Dabbo, because we know that Dabo's not hampering with guys,
9:00
Speaker 4: because he's barely plaguing the transportal game. So he's like
9:04
Speaker 4: the one dude where we can you know, it's kind
9:06
Speaker 4: of like the steroid era in baseball, where it's like, man,
9:09
Speaker 4: there's so few guys that are actually not doing it
9:12
Speaker 4: that we could, you know, could we even properly identify
9:15
Speaker 4: who that is. And I think that's one hundred percent
9:16
Speaker 4: the case when it comes to tampering. Most coaches don't
9:19
Speaker 4: want to speak out. Again, it's against it because most
9:20
Speaker 4: are doing it, whether or not it's them directly or
9:23
Speaker 4: you know, intermediates. That's you know, that's the difference. I
9:26
Speaker 4: think if it comes to like, let anything change here, man,
9:29
Speaker 4: it would they have to be horribly sloppy for anything
9:32
Speaker 4: to come to white here. You know, that's credible in
9:34
Speaker 4: terms of evidence, Like that's like they would have to
9:37
Speaker 4: have direct communication between Pete Golding and these players. A
9:42
Speaker 4: lot of times you've got assistant coaches, analysts, even other
9:45
Speaker 4: go betweens that you know, they're quote unquote maintaining relationships
9:49
Speaker 4: with the guys they start recruiting. So there's always, it
9:51
Speaker 4: seems like always an out that they would have even
9:53
Speaker 4: though it is tampering. And I think that's why it
9:56
Speaker 4: felt like tampering is just an impossible hill to climb.
9:58
Speaker 4: But I mean, I love Dabbo doing this because again
10:02
Speaker 4: he's one of the few guys where it's like, man,
10:04
Speaker 4: this is credible. We know he's we know he's not tampering.
10:07
Speaker 4: I mean, my god, he barely brings in transport players.
10:11
Speaker 3: Yeah, he doesn't like the portal.
10:12
Speaker 2: He's uh, he's like he's reluctantly decided they will actually
10:17
Speaker 2: bring in a couple of guys. But he's he's never
10:19
Speaker 2: going to rank real high on the transfer portal rankings.
10:23
Speaker 4: Right, So I mean, like, for me, he's the guy
10:25
Speaker 4: that if anybody can, you know, can speak out against
10:28
Speaker 4: it and make something happen, He's the guy. And then again,
10:30
Speaker 4: like how you know, how irresponsible was Pete Golding in this?
10:34
Speaker 4: And like, you know, is there enough that he can
10:37
Speaker 4: get out from an evidence standpoint or was he just
10:39
Speaker 4: you know, sloppy And and you know, I'm sure like
10:42
Speaker 4: a lot of other coaches are which are leaving a
10:44
Speaker 4: paper trail behind which you know makes you look guilty.
10:46
Speaker 4: My guess is you know he was probably a little
10:48
Speaker 4: bit smarter than that. And and you know, nothing will
10:51
Speaker 4: come of this, But look, I think we should see
10:54
Speaker 4: more and more coaches do this. I mean, I think
10:57
Speaker 4: of all of the issues that are plaguing in the
10:59
Speaker 4: sport like hampering is certainly the top of mind, and
11:02
Speaker 4: I think probably the most difficult because you have to
11:05
Speaker 4: sort of prove intent and that's the harder part about it,
11:08
Speaker 4: unless there's like a very sloppy paper trail that leads
11:11
Speaker 4: to it. So I think again, the more and more
11:14
Speaker 4: coaches are unwilling to speak out because more most of
11:18
Speaker 4: them are doing it, and so they don't, you know,
11:20
Speaker 4: they're not going to standing against it. I think if
11:21
Speaker 4: you had more that weren't doing it and then therefore
11:24
Speaker 4: speaking out against it, that would be better for the
11:26
Speaker 4: sport overall, because we know what happens, but it's happening.
11:28
Speaker 4: It's such a ridiculous degree that it, you know, I mean,
11:31
Speaker 4: it's it's upsetting.
11:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm not always sympathetic to Dabbo swinning, but he
11:36
Speaker 2: might be kind of standing alone, dying on this hill,
11:39
Speaker 2: fighting this fight because all these other coaches are just
11:42
Speaker 2: like whistling by.
11:44
Speaker 3: I Yeah, tampering's bad, but we're doing it too.
11:47
Speaker 2: So because if you bust out the receipts like Dabo did,
11:52
Speaker 2: obviously the counterpoint to that as well, he let me
11:55
Speaker 2: pull out my receipts of a guy that you tampered
11:57
Speaker 2: with that was supposed to go here, and I think
11:59
Speaker 2: you hit that right on the head.
12:01
Speaker 3: Okay.
12:01
Speaker 2: So adjacent to this is the situation we've already talked
12:05
Speaker 2: about briefly with Darien Mensa, who was not in the
12:09
Speaker 2: transfer portal until the eleventh hour, and it looked like
12:11
Speaker 2: he was staying at Duke, and then Miami apparently convinced
12:15
Speaker 2: him to jump into the transfer portal, and then Duke
12:17
Speaker 2: was like, no, we're going to enforce this contract. We
12:21
Speaker 2: think we have grounds to enforce this contract. And now
12:24
Speaker 2: they're at this strange impasse Duke Darien Mensa, presumably Miami,
12:30
Speaker 2: where you know, much like the demon Williams at Washington situation,
12:35
Speaker 2: Duke is trying to force a guy who doesn't want
12:37
Speaker 2: to be there anymore to be there or at least
12:39
Speaker 2: to get damages.
12:40
Speaker 3: And who's going to pay the damages? If it's not
12:42
Speaker 3: the kid, then is it? At Miami? What comes of this?
12:46
Speaker 4: Yeah? I mean, you know, and I'm glad you brought
12:49
Speaker 4: the Williams piece because you know, for all parties involved,
12:53
Speaker 4: it's a good thing they figured out a way to
12:54
Speaker 4: get that thing settled and rained in because you know,
12:59
Speaker 4: it does feel like these kids have opportunities to basically
13:02
Speaker 4: go wherever they want, whenever they want, regardless of these contracts.
13:05
Speaker 4: And you've got two things to play here. Number one,
13:08
Speaker 4: you know, are the schools willing to take these kids
13:10
Speaker 4: to jail? Are willing to take this to court and
13:13
Speaker 4: willing to fight this? You know? I think that's you
13:15
Speaker 4: have a lot of schools that maybe have guys that
13:17
Speaker 4: have left deals, you know, that are greed to and
13:20
Speaker 4: signed contracts, that are not living up to those contracts
13:23
Speaker 4: and leaving in. The schools are basically left with all right,
13:26
Speaker 4: are we gonna you know, are we gonna pay for this?
13:28
Speaker 4: Are we gonna sue them? Are we gonna are we
13:29
Speaker 4: taken into court? Or are we just gonna let this
13:31
Speaker 4: go because we don't want to sue a kid? And
13:33
Speaker 4: I think you're starting to have more and more examples
13:35
Speaker 4: of the schools fighting back in a way that maybe
13:37
Speaker 4: we didn't anticipate that they would. I mean, look, this
13:40
Speaker 4: all goes back to collective bargaining, right Like, there's no
13:44
Speaker 4: question the validity of these deals if they've been collectively
13:47
Speaker 4: bargained at the top in terms of what needs to
13:49
Speaker 4: be included in them. And I think the situation we
13:52
Speaker 4: have now it sucks because everybody's a free agent every year,
13:56
Speaker 4: and even if you've signed a multiple year deal with
13:59
Speaker 4: your school, you know, they have their own outs and
14:03
Speaker 4: even if you say you've started the out line, you've
14:06
Speaker 4: agreed to this. I mean, what we're seeing is in
14:09
Speaker 4: court these take take time, and so in the you know,
14:12
Speaker 4: in the interim, they're able to transfer and play and
14:16
Speaker 4: find loopholes to figure out ways to get on the
14:18
Speaker 4: field while this is being held up in court. It's
14:20
Speaker 4: not holding up their ability to play. And so yeah,
14:22
Speaker 4: I mean, I think it's there's there's got to be
14:25
Speaker 4: something to do against it, but it feels like it's
14:28
Speaker 4: helpless in the same way the tampering feels like it's
14:30
Speaker 4: helpless because you know, even if you again you you're
14:33
Speaker 4: a school. In the case of Duke, like they're suing him,
14:36
Speaker 4: but it seeming able to then figure out a loophole
14:39
Speaker 4: to play at Miami while this is all still going
14:41
Speaker 4: on and hanging in and like, you know, who knows
14:42
Speaker 4: its three four years down the road, if this is
14:44
Speaker 4: finally settled, it's like, oh, okay, well his career is over,
14:47
Speaker 4: So what's the deal, you know, like it's it's the
14:50
Speaker 4: it's this bizarre waiting game where you use the you know,
14:53
Speaker 4: the the our judicial system to your advantage in terms
14:58
Speaker 4: of the slow pace that it can go at it sometimes,
15:00
Speaker 4: so I think, like even in the case of I'm
15:03
Speaker 4: trying to stop him from playing the school, you can't
15:05
Speaker 4: do that because it takes too long and these guys
15:08
Speaker 4: already playing and seasons behind them by the time this
15:10
Speaker 4: thing is shown in court, Like, I mean, that's exactly
15:13
Speaker 4: what happened with Wisconsin kid kid transfers to Miami. Scott's
15:16
Speaker 4: issuing him, mean while he plays in the National Championship
15:18
Speaker 4: for them, and you know, I mean not what he's
15:21
Speaker 4: out of the NFL. It's still being settled in court,
15:24
Speaker 4: Like who's is Wisconsin to keep paying for it? I
15:26
Speaker 4: think that's the issue here is these things drag out.
15:29
Speaker 4: In some cases, the kids have the opportunity to drag
15:31
Speaker 4: them out as much as they can, and if they
15:33
Speaker 4: have the resources to do so, they do it. But
15:36
Speaker 4: are the schools then, you know, willing to be on
15:38
Speaker 4: the hook from a legal standpoint for bills for years?
15:42
Speaker 4: That's I mean, And that's again why I think it's
15:44
Speaker 4: such a mess up system where like they're almost disincentivized
15:47
Speaker 4: from enforcing these contracts, and it's ridiculous.
15:51
Speaker 2: Do you have a horse in the race in the
15:52
Speaker 2: Super Bowl matchup? We were gifted over the weekend.
15:57
Speaker 4: Not the Patriots. That's my stance here. Mean, aren't we
16:00
Speaker 4: all sick and tired of seeing the Patriots win Super Bowls? Here?
16:03
Speaker 3: Yes?
16:05
Speaker 4: I mean I heard for the Bears. Bears that are
16:07
Speaker 4: tremendously good season. I mean, the Patriots bottomed out, went
16:11
Speaker 4: four and twelve or four and thirteen to two straight years,
16:14
Speaker 4: and now here they are back in it. It's it's
16:15
Speaker 4: a joke. It should not be this good this quickly.
16:18
Speaker 4: Everybody else try to pay their dues. I mean, Cleveland's
16:21
Speaker 4: still rebuilding since, you know, in the early two thousands,
16:24
Speaker 4: and they left when they left Cleveland went to Baltimore.
16:27
Speaker 4: So yeah, I mean, I feel like I'm with a
16:29
Speaker 4: lot of other people where it's like anybody with the
16:31
Speaker 4: Patriots at this point, it just they've won too much
16:34
Speaker 4: and this is too soon and they need some pain.
16:36
Speaker 4: Those Boston sports fans need some pain here.
16:38
Speaker 2: Is there is there anything that we can extrapolate to
16:41
Speaker 2: the college football world about the the Mike Vrabel run
16:45
Speaker 2: out of Tennessee and now on the verge of winning
16:47
Speaker 2: a championship in New England. Or the Sam Darnold you know,
16:52
Speaker 2: in the wrong place a couple of times and then
16:54
Speaker 2: you put him in the right place and now he
16:56
Speaker 2: could potentially be a Super Bowl winning quarterback. Is there
16:59
Speaker 2: h Is there anything we should learn for college football
17:01
Speaker 2: from these things?
17:02
Speaker 4: Yeah? It's me O. See, the Donalds one is the
17:04
Speaker 4: bigger piece because it's it's twofold, it's you know, there
17:08
Speaker 4: may not. Indiana is an incredible turnaround. What they're able
17:12
Speaker 4: to do, and what Donald has been able to do
17:14
Speaker 4: with his career is an incredible turnaround too, and not
17:16
Speaker 4: just from where he was to the Jets, but even
17:19
Speaker 4: I mean the Vikings got rid of him after last
17:22
Speaker 4: season because they felt like, well, he wasn't the guy
17:24
Speaker 4: that would help us win the big game. You know, like, oh, yeah,
17:27
Speaker 4: he's good enough to be a bus driver, and if
17:29
Speaker 4: we've got really good team around him, he'd be good enough.
17:31
Speaker 4: But like, is he enough to get you over the hump?
17:33
Speaker 4: I mean, we just watched him beat Matt Stafford in
17:35
Speaker 4: an NFC championship game, because you know, yeah, we can
17:38
Speaker 4: credit the Seahawks defense, and certainly there's a ton of
17:40
Speaker 4: credit to go to them, but I mean, three hundred
17:42
Speaker 4: and sixty yards three touchdowns didn't make mistakes. Stafford made
17:44
Speaker 4: those mistakes. So I mean he just outdoled Matt Stafford
17:48
Speaker 4: in an NFC Championship game situation. So I think, like
17:52
Speaker 4: number one, what an incredible turnaround. And to think we
17:54
Speaker 4: go from an Indiana situation where their football program turns
17:57
Speaker 4: it around the way that they did to just what
17:58
Speaker 4: Donald did fell Side is incredible. And then yeah, I
18:01
Speaker 4: mean we knew this and if you played a high
18:05
Speaker 4: level you know this, like, yeah, the scheme fit player
18:09
Speaker 4: fit like that thing is one and the same. And
18:12
Speaker 4: if you're constantly watching the same franchise struggle with multiple quarterbacks,
18:16
Speaker 4: then you probably have a general manager, head coach quarterback issue.
18:20
Speaker 4: And I think we've seen a lot of other situations
18:22
Speaker 4: in which it's like it's not the quarterbacks issue, it's
18:24
Speaker 4: more of the system around him. And you know, you've
18:26
Speaker 4: got to have a system that's multiple, that's able to
18:29
Speaker 4: be versatile, be shaped to the players that you have.
18:32
Speaker 4: I mean, I thought Peyton Sean Payton with bo Nix
18:35
Speaker 4: like that offense was Taylor made for Boonix. It's get
18:37
Speaker 4: them on bootlegs, get him on the run, get them
18:39
Speaker 4: on the move. Well that's not gonna work as well
18:40
Speaker 4: for Stidham. Like Sideam's got some athleticism, but it's a
18:43
Speaker 4: different kind of game. So it's like, you know, Denver,
18:47
Speaker 4: I think was put in a bad spot because like
18:50
Speaker 4: they just couldn't they couldn't change their offense to fit
18:53
Speaker 4: Stidham in the same way that they did for Bonicks
18:55
Speaker 4: on such short notice. But I do think that like
18:58
Speaker 4: that just gives you a good example of like, if
18:59
Speaker 4: you've got the right coach that fits your system to
19:01
Speaker 4: fit the skills of the player, you're going to be successful.
19:04
Speaker 4: And I think Donald it's been that. I mean Donald
19:07
Speaker 4: that the Jets was terrible, with the Panthers was terrible.
19:10
Speaker 4: Then he gets on with Kyle Shanahan, he figures out
19:13
Speaker 4: I think Shanahan figures out a better way to use him. Obviously,
19:16
Speaker 4: Kevin O'Connell then took that to a large agree with
19:18
Speaker 4: the Vikings and they had fourteen wins. I mean, he's
19:21
Speaker 4: the first player that it's Tom Brady to win fourteen
19:22
Speaker 4: games back to back seasons.
19:24
Speaker 1: Sam Donald.
19:25
Speaker 4: It's remarkable. So and while I think last year again
19:28
Speaker 4: you could stay with the Vikings like he was sort
19:31
Speaker 4: of in a good situation. He was a bus driver
19:32
Speaker 4: for a good situation. I think it's obvious that he
19:35
Speaker 4: won them this. He won them this spot in Seattle,
19:38
Speaker 4: like he was the reason they're going to the super
19:40
Speaker 4: Bowl and they needed him to play that well. He
19:42
Speaker 4: couldn't just be a bus driver for them to beat
19:44
Speaker 4: the Rams.
19:46
Speaker 3: Yeah, he played great.
19:47
Speaker 2: And it was an incredible duel actually, back and forth
19:51
Speaker 2: between Ryafford, who is a bona fide people talk about
19:55
Speaker 2: him as an MVP candidate every day year, no reputational
20:00
Speaker 2: issues at all for somebody like Stafford, and and Sam
20:04
Speaker 2: Donald was going punch for punch with him. It was
20:06
Speaker 2: a really, really incredible game to see. And Yeah, as
20:09
Speaker 2: much as I can't stand the Seattle Seahawks, it is
20:13
Speaker 2: a great redemptive arc for Sam Donald. We'll see how
20:15
Speaker 2: it plays out in a couple of weeks. As always,
20:18
Speaker 2: I appreciate your time joining me today.
20:19
Speaker 4: Ari, Thank you, You're the best of See you well, brother.
20:23
Speaker 2: Ari Tempkin absolutely the man. You can ask him anything